Senior Technical Project Manager
Location: GB, CMD, London
Department: Production
Salary range: 50-65
Employment type: Full-time
Required experience: Director
Required education: Bachelor's Degree
Industry: Marketing and Advertising
Function: Project Management

Company profile:
The Technical Team and offering at VML London has a very strong heritage dating back to the mid-nineties when the London office was founded. Back in those days we were one of the first few purely digital marketing agencies in London; and back then things were a lot more technically driven than they often are today; as such the Technology team here continues to enjoy a strong strategic influence on the work that the agency undertakes and the clients that we engage.It just works.Technology is brilliant when you don’t have to think about it. That’s what we strive for in our solutions. Our technology team has a strong strategic influence on the work we undertake and are involved as soon as the brief lands. They stay involved throughout strategy, creative concepting and design. Acting as important enablers, we bring new and emerging technology to the table to successfully marry the requirements of our clients with the vision of our creatives.Open standards, open minds.We aim to deliver the most elegant technical solution for your budget, and maintain a technology agnostic approach to development in order to achieve that. Technology can be expensive, both in terms of hard costs and costly mistakes, so we’re as careful with your money as we are with our own.   Perhaps that’s why some of our clients have been with us for over 10 years. When faced with a new problem our first instinct is always to see if someone else has already solved it. As such, the solutions we design are built on the rich eco-system of open source software (OSS); the proven and battle-tested kind that we know will not just do the job quickly and cost-effectively, but also robustly. Where OSS isn't appropriate we always favour solutions that are built to open standards that we know will integrate well with other technologies.Strong partnerships.Our work is complemented by strong partnerships with technology vendors and suppliers.   Proven over time, our established strategic relationships with many of the leaders in software, hardware and other technology solutions help ensure we’re able to continue to offer best-in-class technical solutions for our clients.What we do:High availability and high performance website architecture &amp; developmentWeb content management solutionsCreative technology ideationContent optimisation, search and analyticsHigh volume, multi-locale email campaignsMobile optimisationLocalisation

Job description:
Executive Producers have responsibility for ensuring the smooth running of projects/programmes of work, ensuring the highest quality of deliverables within agreed time and costs.They are expected as such to provide strong leadership and direction to project teams and Producers within your team taking ownership for the development of project scope and implementation.  As part of the role the Producer is charged with ensuring clear lines of communication and managing client expectations appropriately through all stages of delivery.Over and above the role expected of others in the team, Exec’s are also considered the leads for the team, both line managing others and evolving the team capability. As such, Exec producers are ambassadors of the team and for best practice continuous improvement within the VML delivery process.This role seeks someone with grounded experience of technical project delivery with formal exposure to best practice standards and delivery methodologies.Executive Producers may also be required to run or contribute to pitch work.

Requirements:
Challenges:To set standards for delivery that inspire and motivate others – Producers working in the same team, as well as those within other disciplines working on the same account.Effectively programme-manage multiple-projects/work streams where required, maintaining a good understanding of the priorities and interdependencies influenced by the client or internal constraints.To ensure all projects either within a programme or managed by themselves are managed on time and to agreed cost, using the most appropriate resources and best approach to deliver each project.To effectively manage strong on-going client relationshipsTo be analytical with great attention to detail, ensuring consistent improvement in the quality of our outputBe able to react quickly to changes in client priorities whilst maintaining structure and process to assure delivery and quality standards.Management of project budgets in excess of £1m.Knowledge and skills:At least six year’s production experience delivering enterprise-level technical projects.An excellent understanding of project management and implementation methodologies for delivery of web projects, with the ability to lead cross-functional team of designers, creatives and developers.Excellent communication/project leadership skills.Excellent project planning and risk management experience.Experience of working in a dynamic  working environmentExperience of successful line management of other Producers/Project Managers.Strong understanding of commercial and account strategies, with the ability to tailor implementation and wider delivery processes to meet stakeholder requirementsHighly-confident client management skills for project reporting, scope agreement and general engagement. Proven experience of regular client interaction.Experienced in project scoping and planning.Experience working with third-party suppliers as part of delivery of project scope.Highly motivated, adaptable, innovative and keen to learn new skills.Able to manage multiple projects/tasks at onceExcellent project initiation skills including an understanding of ROI.Excellent problem solving skills. Able to unblock barriers and drive solutions, ensuring all stakeholders are involved, informed and clear on risks and issues as they are presented.Excellent attention to detail and an ambassador for quality.Entrepreneurial qualities. The ability to identify opportunities for the agency and our clients.Excellent understanding of the industry and emerging opportunities within the market position VML operatesAble to adapt and support change and identify opportunities to provide continual improvement to process and quality Key responsibilities:Extraction, development and clarification of requirements from clients/account teams.An understanding of what makes effective and clear project briefs, cost estimations and timing plans.Project/programme management of delivery to agreed timescales and costs while driving the producers, project teams and client to the very highest quality of work and solution.Pre-empt project risk and manage stakeholder expectations appropriately to mitigate as required.Manage project and programme resource requirements and bookings to get the right person on the right job, including the management of third parties where appropriate.Managing the accurate and timely collation and reporting of time spent by teams on projects that are running including projections of work to completion.Report to senior management on project/programme status. Plan future resource requirements based on the programme pipeline.Ensuring all deliverables produced across the programme or project are to the required specifications and of the highest quality.Working with the other Execs, the Creative Services team and Head of Production to evolve efficiencies and quality of output within the VML delivery processProviding visibility and planning in conjunction with Head of Production to best fit available team members to projects and accounts across the businessLine management of Producers.Proficient in the use of Microsoft office applications (including Microsoft Project) and other applications/tools to support the role of Project Management. Key relationships:Client: communication and presentation of scope, design, copy and final project and status throughout delivery on projects; liaison on required team training, project or technical learnings and management of risk on the programme.Account teams: account planning and strategy, collaboration to ensure best solution for client and GT, management of pipeline of work.Creative services: resource scheduling and issue escalation.Head of Production: line management, delivery methodology/approach, programme/project escalation.Implementation personnel: staff, workstream and project delivery.Third parties: briefings, managing workflow, financials and project delivery. Broad targets and goals:Managing all projects appropriately within agreed timescales, cost and quality.Achieving the management of the highest quality work for our clients.Through your line management, developing strong Producers who are constantly learning new skills and improving their knowledge of the client, their processes and the digital world.Billable utilization of time in excess of 80%.

Benefits: